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Some scientists write
Tuesday Davis learned more about himself as a person by pushing himself to explore during his time at community college
ANKENY — Mt. Pleasant Community High School graduate Tuesday Davis encourages others to step outside their comfort zones and discover after his time spent at Des Moines Area Community College following high school.
While Davis will graduate from DMACC next month with his eyes set on continuing his studies in Biology and hopefully Sociology next year at the University of Iowa, he spent a considerable amount of time in the DMACC Honors Program focusing on developing writing and public speaking skills.
“When joining a community college and when joining the honors program, I set out three rules for myself,” Davis shared. “I wanted to take classes outside of my major, I wanted to put myself out there and get out of my comfort zone. And I wanted to connect with people.”
While Davis’s first Honors Program project remained within his comfort zone of Biology, he remained true to his mission throughout his time at DMACC and ventured out. His later projects focused on topics like Brokeback Mountain and The L Word.
His latest project focused on living out this philosophy of personal expansion through a poster presentation entitled, “Unleash Your Words: Embrace the Courage to Publish.”
“So, the whole presentation with unleash your words, embrace the courage to publish is me talking about my creative writing journey, how I started to become published, how I continue to embrace my courage and how I continue to try and be vulnerable,” Davis explained.
That’s not all for Davis, though. He continues to push himself and encourages others to do the same as he works on “Writers Speak Better,” which analyzes writers and their public speaking abilities.
He comes at this project with first hand experience as he used his writings about Brokeback Mountain to enter a 7-minute informative speech contest in which he earned second place.
“I think being second is great,” Davis said. “I think I would rather be second more consistently than first sometimes. I think that there’s a huge misconception that being second is a bad thing. There is a misconception that failure is a bad thing, but I think you should want to fail more than you want to succeed at times because if you do, like any sort of science experiment, you’re going to learn more from failing.”
He continued to share these ideas as he put himself out there and gave a three-minute presentation at the Upper Midwest Honors Council Conference as part of a thesis presentation contest.
“All of these projects I've done, they haven't been focused on biology, because that was one of the rules that I didn't want to just take classes within my major,” Davis said.
Davis believes others can benefit from exercising a similar philosophy that encourages slowing down and exploring as they develop into more well-rounded individuals.
“I think we just have scientists that are very single-noted with bio class, chem class, physics class, and they don’t explore these others like history, then they’re not going to be as well-rounded. So, we have to remember even when a class isn’t benefiting my major, it still benefits me as a person.”
Some of the ability to explore like this came from a change in plans for Davis. While he initially planned to attend a four-year college in Minnesota after graduating, financial difficulties pushed him in a different direction that landed him at DMACC.
“I had this huge stigma before coming into community college, just because it's what's been reiterated to me that, OK, if you go to community college, and you got to be dumb, like, there's no reason that you're going to community college,” Davis said. “And so, I've kind of had to dispel this belief that was ingrained in me that other people were telling me that community college is awful, because I had to go to a community college because that is what I could afford.”
Davis dismissed that misconception quickly thanks to his time at DMACC and the exploration he experienced through the honors program.
“First of all, it’s a smarter decision to do something you can afford,” Davis said. “But it also taught me more about myself, and it prepared me for being an adult. … you just kind of are forced to branch out a little bit and get out of that comfort zone and take these classes, and you can learn so much more about yourself and what you life. So, that’s why I’m a big advocate for community colleges nowadays.”
Comments: AnnaMarie.Ward@southeastiowaunion.com
